


Pareidolia

by TheSingerThatYouWanted (orphan_account)



Category: Ghostbusters (2016)
Genre: F/F, Fluff and Angst
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-19
Updated: 2016-09-01
Packaged: 2018-08-09 19:26:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7814194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/TheSingerThatYouWanted
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pareidolia- noun- the imagined perception of a pattern or meaning where it does not actually exist</p><p>Or, Holtzmann's research project gets a little out of control</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I'll be honest, I'm not entirely certain where this fic is going to go, but enough people expressed interest in me expanding a headcanon into a full length fic that I thought I might as well give it my best shot. I'm pretty sure it'll be a mixture of cheesy, fun horror tropes and little angsty character studies. We'll see how it pans out, I'm open to comments and suggestions. Hope you enjoy!

“It’s not what it looks like.”

“I’ll be honest, Holtz, I’m not even sure what I think it looks like.”

Abby took another mouthful of her soup and tilted her head as though a 37 degree change of perspective would help her resolve the situation in front of her into something that made sense. There was what looked like an accordion’s worst nightmare balancing on top of an antique mirror and something else that she couldn’t quite place, all of which was balancing on top of Holtzmann, who was lying on the floor. She seemed pretty much unperturbed by it all.

For a few seconds they just looked at each other, then Holtzmann pushed her yellow goggles up onto her forehead and squinted up at Abby.

“Can you, uh, give me a hand lifting these?”

“Can I finish my soup?”

“Kiiiiinda losing the circulation in my left leg, babe.”

“How much do you really need that leg?”

Holtzmann frowned slightly as though she was actually considering it, lips moving around hypothetical scenarios as she calculated percentages.

“About two percent more than you currently need that wonton soup.”

Putting the soup down with an exaggerated sigh, Abby walked over and bent down to lift some of the junk from on top of Holtzmann. On closer inspection she discovered that the accordion horror movie was actually an old Victorian-style camera, and the device she hadn’t been able to identify was an antique barometer. As Holtz straightened up and shook out her cramped limbs Abby examined the camera with interest.

“You know, as a rule I know I’m better not knowing what you’re planning after you get back from the thrift store, but I have to ask- isn’t this a little old fashioned for you? I mean I understand retro, but the 1800s seem kinda far back.”

With a weird movement that was a kind of whole-body shrug, Holtzmann started to pick up the other items.

“The Victorian era was a pretty significant period in history. Without their advances in science and engineering, all the cool stuff I’m working on wouldn’t exist.”

Holtzmann paused and made a face, though there was a glimmer of affection in her eyes as she continued.

“Patty told me that once. I asked her why she found history so interesting, said that, y’know, I respect her work but I’d always preferred to live in the future. Pretty awesome, really.”

“So you’re trying to recreate their work? You think that having some of their tech lying around will act as inspiration? I’ve gotta say, Holtz, I never thought you were superstitious.”

“We work with ghosts,” said Holtzmann incredulously. Abby shrugged.

“Fair point. You know what I mean, though. Why bring home something so antiquated?”

“Research project,” Holtzmann said, starting to walk away towards the stairs to the second floor. Abby had to hurry to catch up, wonton soup forgotten. “It’s still in the planning stages- something Patty said a few days ago got me thinking, but I don’t want to draw any conclusions yet.”

“Anything I can help with?”

Patty rarely suggested projects, her usual role being to slow Holtz down whenever one of her own ideas got out of hand. The occasional distant “Holtzy, baby, no,” followed by an explosion and a slightly louder “What did I just say?” had quickly become just a part of the soundtrack to the ghostbusters’ headquarters. It was ambient noise, like the distant rumble of the subway or the sound of the pigeons outside fighting over food scraps. If Patty was actually taking an active role in the project then whatever it was, it was bound to be fascinating.

Without turning round, Holtzmann replied “Not yet. We need to work out what theory it is we’re actually testing before we get the real scientists in to analyse it, y’know?”

As she placed the mirror carefully down against one wall, she paused, then turned back to face Abby.

“Actually, maybe you can help. You dated a film major in college once, right?”

“Don’t remind me,” said Abby with a shudder. Holtz shook her head.

“I know, I know, she was the rebound, you were the experiment. I’m not asking you to revisit that mess. No, it’s just- how well do you know your film tropes?”

“Pretty well, I think. I watch a lot of Netflix. You know, between hauntings.”

Walking away from the barometer and mirror to take the camera from Abby’s hands, Holtzmann smiled and kissed her forehead briefly.

“Movie night?” she asked, with a sarcastic wiggle of her eyebrows. “For science?”

Abby laughed.

“Well, who am I to stand in the way of scientific progress?”

“See if you can drag Gilbert away from her whiteboard, and I’ll buy the snacks,” added Holtz, laying the camera down and turning back to the barometer on her workbench. Her fingers were twitching slightly, like she was already imagining how it would feel to take it apart and fix it up for… whatever fate it was she had in mind. This was the point when it was usually best to just leave her to it. Her hair was starting to come out of its thousand or so bobby pins and the residual static from one of her machines was really adding to the overall mad scientist vibe. For a few moments Abby just admired her, watching the way her forehead creased slightly in concentration over every new piece of equipment she got, then suddenly she remembered something.

“Oh, shoot, my soup.”

“Don’t know if I’ve got anything that can hit a liquid target,” muttered Holtz, who was only half listening. Abby was already too far down the stairs to hear her. She’d finally taught Benny the correct ratio of wontons to liquid and she was damned if she was letting that soup go to waste now.

Finally alone in the lab, Holtz switched over into autopilot. She called it ‘The Zone’- that special state of alertness when nothing outside of her experiments and too-loud disco mixtapes really existed. With one hand she slid her goggles down to cover her eyes, the other reaching for a screwdriver.

As she began to carefully pry open the barometer’s casing with the flat edge of her screwdriver, her mouth continued a train of thought that wasn’t quite passing through her brain. She should really start leaving tape recorders around her lab. Though thinking about it she should probably let the others know. One too many arguments about the difference between an invasion of privacy and a convenient method of monitoring when Abby was going to get to work- “No, Holtz, I don’t care if it means you’ll always have my coffee ready in the morning. You don’t get to bug my apartment without asking. If it matters that much to you, I’ll text you when I leave the flat.”- meant it was a lot less hassle in the long term.

“I can already shoot solid or vaporous targets,” she said out loud. “Maybe liquid ghosts are the next big thing.”

In the absence of a notebook or tape recorder, she hoped that a mental note would be enough, and kept working.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This came out way more Erin-focused and angsty than I intended, as much as the loose plan I've got for this counts as me intending anything in particular. Pretty sure the actual plot is gonna pick up next chapter, with, y'know, cheesy horror tropes and more information on exactly what weird hypotheses Holtz and Patty are testing.

By the time two weeks had passed, most nights had become movie nights and Erin had seen more horror movies than she ever wanted to. She was always more of a rom-com girl. For goodness sake, they worked catching ghosts for a living- why would she ever want to watch it in a film in her spare time?

The answer, apparently, was "because Holtz said 'please'."

She'd held up pretty well at first, all things considered. It had even been fun. As she lay curled up beside Patty, not-so-subtly hiding her face in her shoulder every time there was a jumpscare and feeling Abby's hand tighten around hers at the same moment, she couldn't help but remember something she'd heard in high school. A biology student she’d once gone out with, some guy she forgot as soon as she graduated, had taken her to the cinema and told her that being frightened by a scary movie produced the same hormone release as sexual arousal. He’d then dragged her to see Stephen King’s _It_.

The relationship hadn’t lasted long.

Honestly? She could handle the loud noises, the creepy movements, the vampires and werewolves tearing each other apart, though in fairness she did watch the bloodier parts through her fingers. Being haunted every night for the vast majority of your childhood increased your “creepy bullshit” tolerance to somewhere pretty far beyond the national average, as did having not one, but three girlfriends to hide behind if something sudden and violent happened on screen. The ones that really got to her were the possessions.

Neither Abby nor Holtz had been exactly forthcoming about what had happened that day at the firehouse when Rowan had forced his way in. The story came out in a rush one night while they were watching _The Exorcist_ , Holtz and Abby sitting conspicuously far apart.

It broke Erin’s heart when she eventually found out the truth, except all that spilled out of the breach was anger. How dare he hurt her friends? How dare he treat Abby so carelessly, rummage around inside her head, take away her sense of self so completely that for a few weeks she started asking Patty to confirm if the decisions she was making were within character? How dare he make Holtzmann- the youngest of them all, a kid at heart just looking for a family, who had just been beginning to think she’d found one- experience such a betrayal from the first person she’d ever really trusted?

Later that night, after she’d abandoned all pretence at trying to sleep and resigned herself to staring silently at the ceiling in her section of the firehouse, she found herself picking at that anger until she managed to distil it down into separate components. There was protectiveness, yes, but also fear. More fear than she’d ever expected. Underneath that lay an overwhelming sadness. Two of the people she cared about most had been hurt, and she hadn’t been there to stop it.

Before she’d really thought about what she was doing she’d stood up and made her way towards Holtzmann’s bedroom, feet making soft shuffling sounds against the floorboards in her too-large slippers. Just before she reached the door she noticed Abby already there, leaning against the frame.

“Hey,” she whispered. Abby didn’t flinch at the sound of her voice. Clearly the slippers had advantages other than warmth.

“You can’t sleep either?” she asked, by way of reply. Erin shook her head and Abby laughed quietly.

“Yeah, well, think someone might have beaten us to it.”

Erin peeked over her shoulder, leaning in against Abby’s back as she stared into the room. Holtz was curled up on her bed, small and vulnerable in sleep. Stillness wasn’t a natural look on her. She was cradled in Patty’s arm, half lying on top of her really, and every so often she’d make a soft agitated noise and Patty would subconsciously pull her a little closer. At least, it looked subconscious. Just as she was about to tug at Abby’s faded grey dressing gown and suggest they went back to her room, Patty lazily opened one eye and stretched out her other arm.

“You ladies know there’s room for y’all here, right? Just don’t wake Holtzy. It’s been a few days since she got any rest.”

“Are you sure?” asked Erin instinctively. Despite the last several months of being… whatever it was the four of them were, she couldn’t help feeling like an intruder sometimes. Patty cracked open the other eye.

“Baby, I’m gonna pretend you didn’t just ask me if I don’t want to cuddle you. I love you- both of you- and the bed’s bigger than it looks. Get on over here.”

Erin felt Abby’s hand slip into hers, fingers weaving together with practised ease. She looked across at her.

“Come on,” said Abby with a smile.

As she climbed into the bed, a process which involved much confused and sleepy untangling of limbs and several semi-conscious kisses from Holtzmann, Erin felt a little of the tension start to leave her shoulders. She hadn’t realised how tired she was. It made sense- anger always exhausted her, especially when it was so self-contained. They’d already got rid of Rowan. There was nothing else she could do.

“Hey, Er,” mumbled Abby from somewhere on the other side of Patty. “Shut down that brain for a bit. I can hear you thinking yourself awake again from all the way over here.”

Erin started to laugh, but it was a yawn by the time it reached her lips.

Holtzmann’s room was dark, though there were softly blinking lights dotted about on various inventions (and one rather urgently flashing one- she tried not to pay it any attention, reasoning the even Holtz probably wouldn’t put anything lethal where she slept) that gave it a soft, muted glow. Electricity hummed through the walls in a lazy ebb and flow, mirroring the movement of Holtz’s chest as she breathed.

She didn’t remember falling asleep, but she sure as hell recognised the scream that woke her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who's read, liked, commented, or in any way interacted with this story so far! I really appreciate every bit of feedback I get.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own any of these characters. Comments and feedback of any kind are always greatly appreciated. Tumblr username is calamitys-child.


End file.
